Doesn't really feel like Christmas at all
by vonPeeps
Summary: Angsty one shot song fic set post HLV - the five Christmases of Molly Hooper and Sherlock Holmes. Inspired by 'Christmas Lights' by Coldplay.


_**Authors note: **_

_**EDIT: I have been asked to remove the song lyrics - whoops! If you want to get the full experience, listen to 'Christmas Lights' by Coldplay.**_

_I swear I sat down to update my WIP, and somehow this happened. Hope you all enjoy - comments and con-crit always welcome! I was playing around with how to make the word cloud deduction work in text - hope they aren't too clunky..._

_Happy Christmas all you lovely Sherlolly peeps!_

_Disclaimer: These are not my characters. This is not my song. I just put them on the same page and saw how they moved..._

**24****th**** December 2010**_  
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Black velvet and crystals, a discarded puddle at the foot of the bed, shoes kicked off and toppled over each other in the race to leave the world behind her. Golden foil, pulled off chocolate in haste, scattered over the duvet in drifts that echo the snow out on the street. Red wine, some in a glass, a little more staining the crisp white linen (the change earlier in the day now feeling like naïve optimism; stupid, stupid, stupid), even more warming the inside of Dr Molly Hooper. And the shrill call of her phone, echoing through the silent flat until it rang itself out… then starting up again almost as soon as it finished.

"What is it? I told you to leave me alone."

"Um… Molly? It's Mike?" Embarrassed now at the rage she had flung down the phone at her unsuspecting boss, Molly dropped back down to the edge of the bed, her head in her hands.

"Mike, God, sorry. I thought you were… someone else. What can I do for you?"

"Is it a good time…?"

"No different to any other, what's up?"

"I hate asking this, Molly, but we've had an emergency autopsy come in. Orders from up high to get her processed pronto, and bloody Jenkins has gone home sick with the 'flu. I would stay and do it myself, but…"

"Nonsense, Mike, you've been on duty for the last, what, 16 hours. Go home, I'll be there in no time."

"Are you sure?"

"Positive. Happy Christmas Mike."

Hanging up the phone, Molly regarded herself in the mirror. No point in trying to sort her face out for a solo trip to the morgue, just rub off the worst of the mascara trails and the little bit of lipstick not left guarding her wine. Brush through hair, get out the worst of the tangles and those ridiculous curls. Pyjamas – probably not appropriate, even if no one else is going to be in the pathology department at what, 11PM on Christmas Eve. Pulling on her favourite Christmas jumper, Molly hoped the T. Rex that danced across the front would lift her spirits, even slightly. Some holiday this was turning out to be.

The next hours passed in a blur of autopsy procedure, then a procession of unwelcome visitors to her morgue, awkward questions with 'not-her-face' lying on the slab a stark reminder that nothing horrible in the world stopped for Christmas these days. Before she knew it, it was 2.30AM, the damp rain turning to sleet in the frigid morning air as she waited for the taxi she had ordered to arrive. Rubbing her hands together and stamping her feet for warmth, Molly glanced back over her shoulder towards the hospital to see Sherlock leaning against the wall behind her, a lit cigarette dangling from his fingers, a vacant expression covering his face.

"You shouldn't smoke those, y'know. Will make doing your autopsy a bugger." At the continued silence from the saturnine man behind her, she sighed. "Why are you still here, Sherlock?"

"Waiting."

"For…?"

"Transport." Her store of patience finally exhausted by his terse answers, Molly turned her back on him, looking pointedly down the road as if she could summon her taxi with sheer will power. Leaving him to continue his deductions of the slight woman undisturbed.

**Sore ankle.** New cat?

Embarrassed. Old jumper – **sentimental.**

**Exhausted.** Cross.

Alcohol consumed. **Sad.**

Not good.

As a taxi finally pulled to the curb, Molly got in, refusing to pause or turn or in any way acknowledge the man who had broken her heart that evening, and then trampled the pieces for good measure. Slamming the door behind her, she missed the whispered words, or the swirl left by a dark coat while turning to walk away.

"Merry Christmas, Molly Hooper."

**26****th**** December, 2011**

Molly sat, firmly training her eyes to the television, willing herself to lose herself in the animated film that BBC2 had been plugging for weeks. Definitely not looking at her mantelpiece. Not even a glance. And especially not at the mobile that sat on top of it, resolutely silent. There were only two men in the world who had that number, and while a call from one of them would signal disaster, a message from his brother could turn around this miserable day… the horrible week… no the whole bloody month of agony she had just endured. Boxing day was nearly over, and the hope she had buried deep in her chest was starting to sink. After everything she had endured for him, surely today would be the day she got the "I'm alive" message she had begged for. Surely?

The worst, by far, had been the visit to Baker Street. Mrs Hudson had welcomed her, pulling her into a hug that lasted so long that Molly had wondered if the matronly woman had dissolved into tears again. The two women had sat in the kitchen, plates of food in front of them and awkward silences stretching out in between them, the overloud radio filling the flat with echoing, hollow festivity. Not always sure of herself in company, her humour generally hitting the wrong note, and shop talk never welcomed anywhere any more, the stilted conversation had felt like the most awkward, punishing part of keeping this secret.

But she had been wrong. Stepping gently up the stairs to the silent flat above, the creak of her tread on those floorboards – the ones Sherlock had deliberately loosened when he moved in – was the only sound that could be heard in the hallway, despite the open door. Gone was the joyous ring of a violin, the happy chatter of friends on the brink of festivity. Silence.

"John? Are you-" Peering round the door, she saw a familiar sandy head of hair, sat staring into the room. Perhaps seeing the same ghosts that were shouting to her from the year before? Definitely not seeing her. "John?" At her gentle touch on his arm, his eyes seemed to come back into focus, gazing hollowly at her from a face still drawn in pain after three months of grief.

"Molly… did we have plans? I didn't think I'd see you until the 23rd?"

"Um… that's today…"

"Jesus! I'm so sorry, I haven't got anything together yet…"

Desperate to reassure the now-frail man before her, she crouched next to him, strengthening her grip on his arm. Willing him to look her in the eye, rather than fixing his gaze slightly over her shoulder. "Do not worry about anything. Nothing at all. How are you?"

"I'm… I'm… God Molly, I'm just the same. I don't know how to do it. Just pretend that he isn't gone and that life is going on. I can't sleep, I can't work. Sarah let me go from the surgery. I'm a mess. Why aren't you?"

"What?!" As his gaze narrowed suspiciously, regarding her for the first time since she had entered the room, she rocked back on her heels, stunned.

"You loved him too, I know it. "

"I did love him… do love him. We all do, John. I'm just trying to keep myself moving, keep going. Get through each day."

John had slumped back in his chair, eyes closed, defeated. "I keep thinking that its all some mistake. That he's about to storm his way up those stairs, demanding tea or covered in god knows what or sending me out on some wild goose chase around London after some madman. But... he never comes."

"Oh John…"

"I know, its stupid. But how can he be dead?"

After sitting together for a while longer, giving what little comfort she could, Molly had made her excuses and left. The burden of the secret she was keeping had never sat so heavy. Was this exile really going to last over the holidays?

Pausing briefly on the street, debating with herself between the expense of a cab and the walk down the road to the Baker Street Underground in the biting air, a shiver passed through her body, a ghost walking over her grave. Pulling her coat more tightly around her, she stepped out into the street to hail down a passing cab. Completely oblivious to the dark figure that lurked in the doorway opposite her.

Needs new coat.

**Been crying.** Lost three pounds.

Tired. **Guilty.** Lonely?

Alive. **Safe.**

**23****rd**** December 2012**

Organising the Christmas night out for the ragtag mix of people who worked for the Forensic Pathology team and their erstwhile colleagues from New Scotland Yard had always been Mike Stamford's least favourite job of the whole year. For the past seven years, unable to foist the job off onto anyone (not even the usually pliable Molly) he had opted for choosing a venue at random, giving the whole of the budget to the bar and hoping that everyone would be so… merry… that the venue wouldn't really matter.

And, he mused to himself, the system hadn't failed him for six consecutive years – a fairly good streak. It was just a shame that this year, it was going so terribly wrong. The 'Star of Bethnal Green', despite its festive name, had turned out to be a karaoke bar. And the team… well they turned out to be exceptionally awful singers, without exception.

Lestrade had kicked them off with a surprisingly sober version of 'Sex on Fire', staring all the while at the DI who had joined the team not long after the internal enquiry into the Sherlock cases had begun. Who had followed it up with an equally uncomfortable "Maneater". Luckily, by this point that booze had begun to flow, and after the pair had slunk off into some darkened corner, everyone else had begun to relax, rattling through all the Christmas standards and karaoke classics. Pitchy performances were followed by drunken warbling, leading swiftly into the divas who couldn't hold a tune to save their life but thought they were destined for the X Factor stage.

John Watson, at least, was seemingly oblivious to the carnage going on around him. Smiling affectionately at his old mate, Stamford was glad that his months of persistent persuasion had dragged his mate out of his new, sterile flat and back into company. And even more pleased that he had thought to invite the locum nurse, Mary Something-or-other, who was filling in for one of the Path Technician's maternity leave. The flirting between the two of them had been steadily increasing all evening, their faces now illuminated by the glow of their phones as they exchanged numbers.

If only all the couples that were there tonight were so full of the joys of the seasons, Mike mused ruefully. Molly had brought her new boyfriend, Tom, and the atmosphere between them had started out frostily and was quickly turning into an atomic winter. She had fully turned her back on the gangly man at her side, and was flicking testily through the song book on the next table over, barely concealed disdain on her face. Tom, for his part, looked bewildered at this turn of events, and was sat running his hand through his curls distractedly.

_Always pay the extra to get the private room_, Mike told himself. The general public does not need this insight into London's crack investigative division, and they had been drawing stares from the other punters all night. As the last strains of Wham faded from the room, the next singer on to the stage cut through Mike's internal monologue.

"Next everyone, we have Molly, with 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' Big hand for Molly everyone." As Molly poured her heart and soul out into the suddenly silenced room, Mike met eyes with John across the room. Awful was not the word… maybe there were no words to fully describe singing this bad. And the performance, well, Bridget Jones eat your heart out…

Swaying drunkenly from side to side, tears beginning to slide silently down her face, Molly looked out across the darkened pub. Full of her friends, her colleagues, even her new lover, and yet still empty. Faltering and fading her way to the end of the song, she lurched off stage and pushed her way out into the street, followed by a concerned John Watson, his locum nurse in tow. Finding her slumped against the pub wall, barely supporting her own weight, John pulled her into a rough hug against his chest, barely catching the words which fought their way out between the sobs.

"Fifteen months… such a long time… told myself to make it through six months… but this long… two Christmases… can't do it…"

Tipping her chin up, John looked down gently at the tear-streaked face. "You can do it Molly. It's what he would expect from us."

"But Sherlock-"

"Is dead, Molly. And we're not. So we live, day by day when we have to. You're not alone, you've got good friends, that new fella seems nice…"

"Oh God!" clapping her hand to her suddenly aching head in mortification, Molly continued, "Tom! What is he gonna think…"

"He nipped out to use the loo, honey. Won't even know you're gone." Turning to look at the petite nurse, Molly hiccupped,

"Really?"

"Really. Now, lets get you cleaned up."

As they turned to guide Molly back inside, only one man remained on the street, seen but not observed by the three sombre revellers. He had flitted in and out of the shadows for these long months, periodically checking on all his people, but none so often as John Watson and Molly Hooper.

_**John –**_ cane gone **(at last)**

**Needs to shave. **Gained back last pounds.

Safe. **Happy.**

_**Molly -**_ drunk

Got a boyfriend - **dull.**

**Suffering.** Safe.

Sad.

**December 24****th**** 2013**

The party at Baker Street was a muted affair, tension still hovering between John and Sherlock after his unexpected return two months earlier. Mrs Hudson and Mary were engrossed in wedding planning, discussing the difference between ochre and mink for the bridesmaids, John listening in, bewildered. Lestrade had been and gone, determined to spend the evening with his wife now that they were, once again, a going concern.

Molly sat quietly at the edge of the group, a half smile pasted on her face to avoid gaining attention from anyone in the group. Tom had refused to come with her, and the bitter row that they had had before she left still echoed in her ears, accusations of feelings she had absolutely, one hundred percent, decided were left in the past being flung at her again. Tom had been amazed to hear her part in Sherlock's fall, partly incredulous that the little mouse he was dating was capable of something so daring, partly horrified that she would act so blatantly outside her professional guidelines for the man who currently was gazing out at the street below. Since then, peace had been thin on the ground between the two of them and goodwill was definitely lacking.

At the sound of a quiet exhalation from the window, Molly looked up. The distance between the former flatmates, so different to the previous bond that they had shared worried her. Concerned for both of the men, Molly rose to intervene in the only way she knew.

"Are you okay?"

"You need a new line, Molly."

"Why, when this one works so well?"

"You, out of all people, know I'm not."

"He'll come around, you know." At his blank look, she pressed on. "John, I mean. He just needs to process what happened."

"Oh, right, John. Yes. Process it." Rising to place a kiss carefully on his cheek, Molly nearly missed the next words, muttered reluctantly as if addressed to nobody. "I'm lonely. Back, but alone."

"Oh Sherlock, you're never alone. You just need to reach out…" Wrapping a hand around his arm, she towed him through the room back to her perch on the sofa, striking up a conversation with John about his return to blogging now that they had started seeing clients again. Trying to draw Sherlock in and patch the cracked relationship back together again, meeting his quizzical expression with a warm smile whenever she realised he was looking at her.

**Kind.** Rowed with [fiancé] **(again)**

**Lost five pounds. **

Sad when unobserved.

**Oblivious. **

**1****st**** December 2014**

__After the unholy press of people on the Tube, Molly was glad to be on the streets, the cold kept at bay with copious woollen items and her lovely thick winter coat, a late Christmas gift three years earlier (although she had never quite worked out who had sent it to her). As the first flurries of snow started to fall, her steps slowed and ceased as she watched the dance of the flakes in the yellow beam of the streetlight. _This year,_ she reflected, _I can have a happy Christmas. Just me (and Toby of course). _Refusing to acknowledge to herself that this calm, placid kind of happy was maybe not the deep seated, down in the gut happy she had always dreamed of, she reached up to push her headphones securely back into place before continuing on her way, Michael Bublé crooning to her about being home for Christmas.

Lost in her own thoughts, she was almost into her flat before she noticed that there was a sliver of light shining out from the crack which ran along the base of the door. Sifting through her bag to pull out her often clutched but never yet used can of pepper spray, Molly cautiously eased her key into the lock and pushed the door open, trying to make as little noise as possible. Slipping off her shoes in the cramped hallway, Molly assessed what she should do – muted light was radiating from the lounge that she had left in darkness, and Toby was no where to be seen; by now, he would normally be twining his way around her ankles pleading to be fed. Still nervous following the return of Moriarty earlier in the year, Molly stepped silently back out into the corridor of her block of flats, dialling Sherlock's number. Only to hear the haunting notes of a violin rise up within her flat, heart achingly sweet.

"Sherlock?" she called quietly, still cautious.

"Molly? You're late."

Smiling, she stepped back in through the door. "That key is for emergencies, you know. Criminal masterminds, cat sitting, that sort of thing…"

"I had urgent business."

"In my lounge?"

"Patently."

Stepping into the room, expecting to see him absorbed in his laptop, the room lit by the neon glare of the laptop screen, Molly was brought up short by the sight that met her – in the bay window of the room stood a Christmas tree, the angel on top grazing the ceiling with the tips of its wings. Her favourite decorations graced its branches, as did some she had never seen before; new to her but without the plastic shine of modern new baubles. Toby sat at its base, idly batting one of the lower hanging baubles whenever it rocked his way.

"A tree."

"Brilliant Molly, although I was hoping for a little more…"

"Where did it… did you…?" Looking at the tall detective, suddenly unsettled and shifting his weight from side to side in agitation, she considered her next question carefully. "Why?"

"For you, Molly Hooper. You deserve a truly happy Christmas this year. I realise that, due to my actions both intentional and unavoidable, these past years have been rather lacking in Christmas cheer for you, and for that, I am truly sorry. So…" Spreading his hands in a sheepish gesture to encompass the room, he continued to regard her, calculating what his next move should be.

Only to find that the decision had been taken away from him; Molly had run across the room and wrapped her arms around his waste, rising to her toes to kiss him on the cheek. Pausing slightly as the kiss finished, tension suddenly spinning out achingly between the two of them. Angling her head slightly to kiss him again, millimetres closer to his mouth, lingering fractions of a second longer. Summoning his courage, he turned, bringing his lips to hers and sinking into a kiss so full of longing and passion that they both came away breathless.

Beautiful.

**Happy.** Excited. **Radiant.**

Aroused. Effervescent.

**In love?**

**Mine?**


End file.
